As the New Year begins, a trio of health care statistics cast an intense and unflattering light on a nation in crisis.
These figures, all of them unimaginable just a generation ago, set the stage for a financial reckoning in 2023 and beyond.
Shocking stat #1: the number of Americans on Medicaid
Without looking it up: What percentage of Americans receive some or all health-insurance coverage from the government?
You might assume a low …
When I walked into the ultrasound room, I immediately noticed the patient’s red-rimmed eyes and cloud of mussed-up brown hair. My eyes tracked the defeated curve of her back and its stark contrast to the sterile environment of the obstetrics and gynecology exam room, with its muted grey and blue tones. A forty-year-old woman, she had used in-vitro fertilization to become pregnant because she wanted her toddler son to have …
I wasn’t supposed to hear this, but I did. It sealed the deal for me. It was one of the reasons I had to finally leave my true love: ICU nursing. After 33 years as an ICU nurse, I knew it was time to go.
I used to feel like I had a purpose. I used to think I was a dynamic part of saving lives in the ICU. I lived …
In a medical malpractice lawsuit, your defense is completely in the hands of the malpractice carrier, and, make no mistake of it, its interests come first. However, the medical malpractice insurance contract is more instrumental in the defense of a doctor than insurance companies realize. There are clauses in the contract that, at first glance, seem to benefit carriers. However, there is a flip side to each clause.
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“Make thorough inspection.”
– Sir William Osler, MD.
The art of the physical exam is precisely that: an art that must be practiced often, for years on end, and the one that a physician may become a great achiever or skilled but never the master.
When I trained in internal medicine over a decade ago, our program director often harped on this art. I was too naive to understand his message at the …
Not only does medical practice coaching teach you how to open your mind to who you really are, but it also allows you to bypass the dreaded $20,000 to $50,000 MBA business education that your medical school refused to teach you about.
When you recognize that many highly educated professional athletes hire personal coaches throughout their careers, you must wonder what value they find in being coached. You would think that …
This article is sponsored by Pattern. We simplify disability and life insurance for busy doctors so they feel confident they have the right policy and that their income is protected.
As a physician, your career is one of the most important investments you will make in your life. Not only have you spent thousands of dollars and countless hours in medical …
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In this episode, we will be discussing the role of health system specialty pharmacies in improving patient outcomes.
Our guest, Chelsey Lindner, is a clinical pharmacist who will share her insights on the unique combination of expertise and …
An excerpt from On Medicine as Colonialism.
For about seventeen years, from 1991 until 2008, I lived in little Scituate, Rhode Island, where I practiced family medicine, and for about eleven of those seventeen years, I practiced out of the basement of my house. It was an older style of primary …
The skill
Patient safety, patient experience, workforce health, and cost-effectiveness are critical outcomes with an important common root. They’re all impacted by our ability to communicate effectively and respectfully. Additional terms to describe these skills include people, interaction, interprofessional, relationship, and social skills. They can even be used to describe behaviors inherent in many properties of complex adaptive systems, such as the butterfly effect, flexibility, and adaptability. The more we understand …
I arrived at my desk after a holiday hiatus with renewed energy to tackle the day. It sat there, unassuming, on my desk with a note. My heart was giddy, knowing my tea pastime would level up. Opening the letter, I realized it was from my boss. My boss had given me a tumbler, and I felt like a kid on Christmas morning. The excitement seemed out of proportion to …
This time, it’s my family.
My work takes me all over the U.S., consulting on the implementation of virtual care to get the most appropriate level of care to the patients who need it. I work with teams to develop better workflows and to get more experienced eyes on patients. It’s the kind of care anyone would want for their own family.
I was flying to Utah to assist a hospital system …
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When my kids were born (3 within 19 months), one thing became very clear: there was only one way that I could possibly accomplish all of my goals. I wanted a fulfilling, successful career, with big aspirations. I also wanted to be really happy and present in my personal life. I didn’t want to sacrifice my career and didn’t want to sacrifice my personal life. I wanted success and fulfillment …
A pregnant Somali woman was determined to have a vaginal delivery. Unfortunately, labor wasn’t progressing as expected, and the health care team recommended a C-section. The patient declined the recommendation and said it’s in God’s hands. After some persistence, the health care team convinced the patient to get a C-section. After the C-section, the patient felt disappointed that her wishes weren’t considered. The OB team, however, didn’t understand why the …
Our previous post discussed how a full-time equivalent equals 2,080 work hours annually. To further clarify, we would like to explain how work hours during federal holidays can be calculated. One approach is to offer employees an incentive by counting each work hour after-hours as 1.5 and each work hour during federal holidays as two during the calculation of payable annual work hours. This can encourage employers to expect …
It’s your first visit to a cardiologist because you’ve had occasional episodes of an irregular heartbeat. As you fill out your pre-appointment paperwork, you carefully list the symptoms you’re experiencing and the treatments your primary care physician has recommended before referring you to a specialist. You don’t mention that you recently started taking Lexapro (escitalopram) to treat depression because you’re focused on your heart issue.
But that accidentally omitted information could …
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In this episode, Nancie Wiseman Attwater discusses her husband Bill’s struggle with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. Despite the doctor’s advice to change his diet, Nancie realized that it was probably too late for that to make a difference. …
I recently watched The Color of Care, a documentary highlighting the disparate and inequitable care received by Black and brown individuals during the COVID-19 pandemic. During the movie, Executive Producer Oprah Winfrey opined that one of the primary health care issues is the “empathy gap.” Upon hearing the phrase, I shot up in my chair, as it felt eerily (and painfully) similar to what I described in …
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